Florida’s proposed Amendment 5, widely known as the “Florida tax swap” was designed for the permanent elimination of “required local effort” by local schools to obtain state funding. Under this amendment, the Florida legislature was required to replace this funding by alternate means including increasing the sales and use tax rate, repealing certain sales tax exemptions, or other component spending reductions of the state budget during 2010 and 2011. The annual maximum increase in local real property assessments would also have been reduced to 5% from the current 10% for all property taxes except school taxes.
In a recent Florida Supreme Court decision, the court affirmed the final judgment of the Circuit Court and ordered that Amendment 5 must be removed from the November 2008 general election ballot. The court ruled that the ballot title and summary of Amendment 5 was unclear and ambiguous and failed to fairly inform voters of the primary purpose of the amendment. (Florida Department of State v. Beverly Slough, et al., Florida S. Ct., Dkt. No. SC08-1569, 09/03/2008 .)